Chapter 2

CHAPTER 2

ALAN

M y stomach churned as the black SUV bounced along a corrugated mountain road. On my left wrist, the suppressor bracelet put out a smothering wet blanket of anti-magic, sapping my energy. The metal handcuffs rubbed my skin, but I'd wear a hundred handcuffs to get that damned suppressor off. I felt my eyelids drifting down and pinched my thigh again to stay alert. I'd be black and blue by the end of the ride, but I didn't want to miss any clues to where I was.

We'd left Shadecliff heading north, which surprised me because only about a hundred miles of American soil lay between Shadecliff and the Canadian border. But we'd eventually turned east and wound our way on a paved two-lane road up through the mountains. My time sense was thrown off, with being yanked out of my morning run and the way the cuff muffled the world around me, but I guessed it was about four hours later when we switchbacked down out of the Cascades and then turned north again on the kidney-buster of a dirt road.

Four hours' drive is a long way from home. I had absolute faith that Jason would try to find me, and Erin and Dale as well, but the more miles grew between me and Shadecliff, the harder their job would be.

Unfortunately, that might actually be a good thing, because they were wonderful friends and strong folk but not even close to a match for the grim focus and heavy firepower of the men in this kidnapping convoy. Excuse me, arresting , but it sure didn't feel like an arrest. As much as I wanted to get away, I didn't want to see anyone I cared about hurt trying to make that happen. Jason had a bit of a temper. Erin did too. I needed them to stay safe.

"When do I get to see a judge?" I asked, partly to keep myself awake. I'd asked that a few times. Maybe twenty.

"Shut up." The guard in the seat beside me had a very limited vocabulary. Just those two words, as far as I could tell, and a tendency to whap me with his hand if I pushed too hard. The two men in suits in the front seats ignored us both completely.

"I'm a U.S. citizen. It's my right to appear in court?—"

"Shut up." This time, he emphasized the command with the hardest backhand to my chest so far, driving a grunt from my lungs. I decided keeping my ribs intact was a higher priority and turned to focus back on the scenery out the smoked-glass window.

Dry rain-shadow terrain had replaced the lush western forest, and tufts of gray-green sagebrush and rabbitbrush dotted the arid landscape, with sparse pines poking up among them. If I knew the shape of the local mountains, I might've had a better idea of where we were, but I'd never traveled this far east. The SUV climbed sharply, then descended and stopped at a tall gate set in a wire-topped, chain-link fence. The driver tapped a code into a control panel on a post, and the gate rolled ponderously open. We passed through and down into a gravel parking area alongside a large, low, concrete building with tiny windows. The place looked ominous even on this sunny morning.

The driver parked the SUV, and the car that had followed pulled up beside us. The older suit-clad leader in the seat ahead of me, whom Jason had called Underhill, finally looked up from his tablet. He'd been fixated on it the entire drive, ignoring my sporadic questions and my guard's attempts to shut me up alike. He twisted to look back at me. "You're going to get out of the car, walk to that building, and go inside. I prefer that to happen on your own two feet, but if you try anything, my men will have no hesitation knocking you out and carrying you."

"Try what?" I raised my cuffed wrists. "You have my hands tied, I'm five-seven, a hundred and forty pounds soaking wet, and an elementary school teacher. You think I'm going to karate-chop my way through half a dozen armed guards?"

"You'll find, Mr. Hiranchai, that I take no chances. With anything."

"How very boring of you, Mr. Underhill." Sniping at the man controlling my immediate future wasn't smart, but it gave me some illusion of free will.

His frown deepened. "Commander Underhill, actually."

"Commie—" I pronounced it to annoy him. "—Underhill, then. Where are we?"

Underhill just shifted his attention to the uniformed thug next to me. "Bring him inside to processing. I'll be along later." He got out and strode away across the parking area. The driver followed suit, trotting after him.

The thug at my side was likely to appreciate my humor even less, and I didn't think the threat to knock me out had been idle. I'd no doubt need to pick my battles, and this wasn't a useful one. When one of the guards from the other car came and opened my door, I got out in response to his wave, rolling my shoulders and stamping my feet after four hours of sitting still.

I used the head-rolling to look around, but there wasn't much to see— the main building with its concrete walls and dark windows, a few small cabins located up the tree-scattered slope behind it, one tall shed with a steep roof?—

"Move it." The nearest guard gave me a shove toward the building. I stumbled but caught myself in time to avoid a fall. Underhill and his follower vanished into a cabin up-slope, but the three remaining men were more than sufficient with their muscles and their guns to herd me to the door of the big building. The steel panel swung open. I had the sudden panicked thought this might be my last glimpse of freedom. Suppressor or not, I tried to haul my magic up from my core and do something, anything. My effort drowned in cotton wool and wisps of green that slipped through my grasp. The cuff on my wrist heated, pulsing with my heartbeat till my breath came short.

The guard behind me gave me another shove. "Indoors!"

I tripped over the sill and staggered into the reception room beyond. Rather than the gloomy darkness I half expected, powerful bulbs overhead cast everything in bright relief. Ten feet farther in, a wall of metal bars divided the room, with a barred door set in them. One of the guards undid my handcuffs, gripped my left arm above the cuff, and hauled me over there. Another opened the barred door with a code in a lock panel. An alarm chimed as the door slid aside.

A tall, thin man in the same black uniform but without the tactical vest and gear appeared from a corridor beyond the bars. "New intake?"

"Yep. Hiranchai. Commander Underhill collected him." The guard holding my arm maneuvered me to the opening.

"If I'm being arrested, you haven't read me my rights," I protested, ignoring the dizziness threatening to swamp me. Some kind of spell on the bars, probably, but with my power locked down, I couldn't be sure.

The new man laughed. "You're a sorcerer. You have no rights."

"This isn't 1995!" I remembered some oppressive history from the end of the Upheavals, but surely, we'd come a long way since then.

"The laws are still on the books," the man said. "Selectively enforced, but we here are among the enforcers. Kick off your shoes, turn around, and put your hands against the bars."

The guard who'd ridden beside me all the way shoved me forward and hit a control that slammed the barred door shut. The finality of that metal clang vibrated in my bones. As he turned away, I had the crazy impulse to beg him not to go. He was an abusive jerk, but he was a connection to the world beyond. I stayed silent as the SWAT-geared agents all left the building.

"Some house rules." The new guard's voice sounded almost conversational. "Do as you're told, and you won't get hurt. Much." He touched my forearm with a short baton. A vicious jolt of electricity arced through me, dropping me to the ground as I cried out. Every muscle seized. My eyes watered. I shivered against the concrete floor, tasting blood where I'd bitten my tongue.

"Let's begin again," the tall guard continued. "I'm Captain Poe. You can call me sir. I'm in charge of daytime organization here in the facility and I really hate when my routine is disrupted. Stand up now, kick off your shoes, face the grate, spread your legs, and put your hands on the bars."

Quips rose to mind as I lay there trying to get my twitching muscles under control. Any relation to Edgar Allen Poe? But one taste of that baton made me afraid to risk it. As soon as I could, I staggered to my feet, toed off my sneakers— an easy task despite my trembling since the guard in the SUV had taken away the laces— and turned to face the barrier.

I didn't want to touch the bars. I was pretty sure magic wove through them, a prison stronger than any iron or steel. But when Captain Asshole tapped my shoulder with the uncharged baton, I leaned forward and gripped a bar with each hand. My suppressor cuff hummed, and the fingers of that hand tingled with pins and needles. An internal tug-of-war hauled the fabric of my magic back and forth, toward the bars, then back through the cuff into my core. Much as I hated the cuff, it seemed to be keeping my power in me, away from the barrier.

"Right." Poe frisked me up and down, not lingering at my crotch but not avoiding it either. When he was done, he backed up. "Turn around."

Glad to let go of that gate, I pushed upright and turned to face him.

"More house rules," he told me, tapping the baton against his palm. I didn't let the wish he'd accidentally turn it on show on my face. "You're here to answer questions, not ask them. No conversation with the other inmates, no magic, no resistance."

"Resistance is futile," I said in a Borg voice. Apparently, my inner smartass needed more convincing to shut up. I flinched.

But Poe just grinned. "Yes. You think that's a joke, but you'll find out it's the truth." He gestured down the corridor to my left. "Go on, now. Two steps ahead of me. I'm generous. You may put on your sneakers first. Keep your hands in the air."

Refusing, just to be contrary, was stupid. Even unlaced, my sneakers were more protection than socks. I jammed my feet into them, kicking the heels to get the tops unfurled.

"Down the corridor now. I'll tell you when to stop."

The hallway stretched down what was probably the entire length of the building, with solid doors on either side. As we passed each door, I wondered who was behind them. Other unregistered sorcerers? Something worse? I didn't let my imagination come up with what would be worse. About two-thirds of the way along, Poe called out, "Stop there."

I obeyed, and he went to the door I'd just passed and keyed in a code. The door slid open sideways. Beyond it, I could see a sparsely furnished room.

"Inside."

I turned, but hesitated.

Poe shook his head. "Now, Hiranchai. You don't want to make this difficult. That room's better than half the motels in that little podunk town you come from. Shadecliff, wasn't it? Although I guess your boyfriend's place had some luxuries. Jason, right? A firefighter. Dangerous occupation, that. Shame if anything happened to him."

I froze. Is he threatening Jason? We were four hours away from home. His innuendo shouldn't have been scary, but bile stung my throat. He knows way too much. Poe's not just some guard muscle. Captain. He's in the thick of whatever this is.

Bowing my head as I passed him, I walked into my cell.

Poe stepped into the doorway, tapping that fucking baton on his palm again. "Good boy. Someone will be around to see you, eventually." He slid the thick door closed between us. The solid clunk echoed with finality, like the lid closing on a coffin.

Don't be stupid. It's a cell, not a grave. You'll be out of here soon enough.

I gave my flailing anxiety a firm mental smack, kicked off my shoes by the door, and looked around. The room was maybe a dozen feet square, illuminated by two tiny, barred windows side by side near the top of the outer wall. I stretched up and could hook the tips of my fingers onto the lip of the nearer windowsill. Seven and a half feet, or thereabouts, and that made the ceiling something over eight. A buzz that felt like the barrier magic sucked against my fingertips as I pushed my hand along the sill toward the glass and I dropped my heels to the floor. Warded. Not that it mattered. I was small, but even I couldn't get through a nine-inch-tall window, bars aside.

A single bed stood against the wall in the far corner. In the opposite corner, a small wooden table and chair made this a little less of a spartan cell. An open doorway in one wall revealed a bathroom beyond. The ceiling panels were out of reach unless I climbed on a chair, but two of them looked frosted, suggesting recessed lighting. I scanned the wall near the door but didn't spot a switch. The floor and walls were solid concrete, the metal door was opaque without a window in it.

No window in the door probably means there are cameras. A person like Poe would want to know what his charges were doing. Angling my head and squinting, looking for a glint of light, I thought I spotted a lens in a corner of the ceiling opposite the bed.

What can I do to fuck with him? I eyed my sneakers. I could throw a shoe at the camera, but rubber and canvas wouldn't do much damage. I could pretend to be casting a spell, write runes with… well, my blood, if it came to that. But I could tell the cuff wouldn't let my magic reach the surface, and no doubt Poe knew that very well. Fake-casting seemed like a plan for another time.

Wait. Gather data. I'd never been in a prison more serious than high school detention. I didn't have a book to read under the desk this time, or even a clock to watch the minutes tick by on.

They have my phone. What'll they do with it? I kept the screen locked, of course, but behind that lock were all my friends from Erin and Sylvester on. How good is a phone lock? Can they crack it?

Of course, all they had to do was point a gun at my head and tell me to put my finger on the sensor. Stupid thing was flaky and sometimes took five tries, but what were the odds it'd fail at the right time, not the wrong one?

I paced the width and length of the room, getting a feel for the size of my prison. The chair and table were spindly and glued, no nails or screws, not much use even as a blunt object in a fight. For a prison, the mattress on the bed gave comfortably as I sat on the edge. Is that just a luxury, or a sign they're set up for long-term captivity?

Without planning to, I sat on the bed in lotus position, pressed my hands together, and tried to clear my mind. Meditation had never been my best skill. My brain wanted to race through what-ifs and what-nows. Still, I tried to center, find peace and calm, and then launched into a chant. I didn't truly believe in the religion of my childhood anymore, but what could it hurt? The familiar rhythm, sounds, and meanings soothed my racing heart and as a bonus, I bet by the fiftieth repetition, whoever was watching and listening to me would be getting sick of it. And I could go on for hours. Win-win.

I was about fifteen minutes into my goal of boring any observer out of their skull when I saw a flicker of movement outside the nearer of my windows. Gold and green movement and my heart leaped, even as I kept the chant going without a hitch. Sunny!

My familiar perched on the outside ledge of the nearer window and peered in at me. I watched from the corner of my eye, keeping my gaze apparently fixed on the bathroom doorway. Pretending to flick my hair out of my face, I tried to gesture at him to go away, go for help. Sunny cocked his head. I reminded myself he was an old, wise bird who knew when a strategic retreat was smart. If Sunny knew where I was, he could tell the others. I wasn't sure what my friends could do against NSEP, but at least I hadn't vanished into some kind of limbo. I hadn't realized how terrified I'd been of disappearing until I had to press my palms together harder to keep them from shaking with relief.

Sunny vanished from my sight and I pictured him winging his way across the countryside for help. He couldn't fly back the couple of hundred miles we must have traveled, but he could use a phone and the internet. He'd figure something out?—

A little sound down under the bed made me blink and I chanted louder. He wouldn't… couldn't…

"Put your damned feet down to give me some cover." Sunny's voice barely reached my ears.

I unfolded out of lotus pose and lowered my feet to the floor, still chanting. Sunny was a small bird. If I kept my ankles together, he could hide behind them. I desperately wanted to look up at that camera lens and calculate the angle, but I held my gaze fixed straight ahead and raised my voice, rocking so any movement of Sunny's would be masked by my own.

"I can't get you out, not now," Sunny murmured. "Don't know who can. The whole building's spelled against rune magic. Luckily, not against familiars. I'll call Erin. She'll know what to do. Or the Professor."

The familiar chant flowed from my lips, and I didn't dare stop or comment. There was nothing useful for me to say anyhow. Begging him not to leave me alone was stupid, counterproductive, might even get him killed. It was a good thing my voice was busy.

Sunny rubbed his beak over my heel, a brief caress. "Heading out now, but I'll be back. Hang tight."

I raised my hands high, fluttering my fingers distractingly, figuring an observer would have no clue about religious practices, and intoned, "Yes, yes, yes, thank you, yes, Lord Buddha." My voice drowned out any small sounds from below, but when I went back to minute after minute of chanting, palms pressed together, my feet planted on the floor, the silence around me told me Sunny was gone. I did the "Yes, Buddha," gestures again, for consistency. I'm a bit of a perfectionist that way. Somewhere in the wide-open sunshine outside those small windows, Sunny winged to my rescue. I would believe in that.